1920 – Estimated 17,300 Chinese Entered the United States Illegally since the Passage of the 1882 Chinese Exclusion Act

“The Chinese exclusion laws greatly hindered Chinese immigration into the United States, but… they did not serve as the total barriers that exclusionists hoped they would. An estimated 17,300 Chinese immigrants entered the United States through the back doors of Canada and Mexico from 1882 to 1920. U.S. Bureau of Immigration reports and newspaper accounts indicate that they entered the country through Seattle, Washington; Buffalo, New York; San Diego, California; San Antonio and El Paso, Texas; and numerous other points along the northern and sothern borders of the United States.”